Greetings de España

hola, mis amigos out there in internet land. i have to say that my trip to spain did not start out on a pleasant note. neither did my friend kate´s. see, they lost our luggage. we have it now, but we´ve been here since sunday. it sucked. our luggage got stuck in amsterdam, and we went to madrid. it really sucks losing your bags in a foreign country (especially one whose language is not your own). but anyway, our luggage eventually made its way back to us, and i was really glad i packed some clothes in my carry-on.

our first night here, we spent the night in the dorms at the university of alicante, and we took a tour of the campus the next morning. there was drama over phone cards, but it all worked out. the next day, we made our way here to the marine lab, where we´ll be staying for the rest of the trip. the facility here is really nice (except that every time you take a shower, there is a lake in the bathroom floor). the weather is beautiful (i.e., not cold), and the mediterranean is amazing. we did some good snorkeling a couple of days ago before we had to actually start our projects. of course, in addition to the work we´ve been enjoying the spanish culture (our prof is from alicante) and having a little fun.

they eat weird things here, dude. i ate an ovary yestertay. how freakin´crazy is that? you did not read that wrong. one of the profs from the u of alicante bought it for us. it was a smoked and dried tuna ovary (called a hueva). it tasted extremely fishy, and the thought of eating an ovary just generally weirded us all out. i´ve also eaten cuttlefish since i´ve been here, but those were really tasty. our prof is making sure that we are well immersed in real spanish life.

there is a big festival in santa pola this week (santa pola is 5 minutes from the marine lab), and tonight a bunch of us are going to run with the bulls. not like in pamplona, though. this is supposed to be pretty tame. i´ll probably chicken out. it should be fun either way. there was drama this morning when we went to sign up, and some guy kept yelling and touching himself, and then he yelled at an old lady.

i need to run now, but i´ll try to update again soon. for those on facebook, there are a few pictures on there from maine and spain. i´ll put up albums of my own soon, though.

hasta luego!

Maine in Pictures

so, it's my one day at home between maine and spain, and i'm incredibly busy... but not too busy to share some photos of my trip to maine. i'm sure the whole thing sounded pretty crazy from my last couple of posts, and it was. i hereby make a solemn vow to drink less in spain than i did in maine. that actually shouldn't be that hard, seeing as all i'd have to do is stay sober for more than three nights. despite all the drinking, i was never hung over on the trip, and i never puked. i had one iffy moment after stupidly taking a swig of vodka straight from the bottle, but i got over it. i heard from cautious eric today, and apparently all the boys at the darling marine center miss us already. he says it's way too quiet without us wacky girls.

anyway, here are some photos.



the hill we walked up many times on the way from the wet lab to the cabins...
















me and nicole making funny faces in a lobster





















the dead seal we saw at the tide pools (gross!)
















boston college mike, ali, and other mike
















canadian ben and nicole
















me with anothony the nice italian boy

















bc mike, ali, other mike, and cameron
















canadian ben, nicole, randi, cautious eric
















that's all i've got for now, but i'll try to make an album to share soon.

Everybody Loves LaTina

wow. no posts for 12 days, and now i manage two in one day. i'm having fun here in maine, despite being chilly (really chilly at night) and despite having a guy pick me up and jump into 60 degree water with me (fully clothed - that was saturday night, and those clothes still aren't dry). i've met lots of cool people (plus that one ass, whom i think i've pissed off because he's stopped talking to me when he sees me). i've given most of them nicknames. that was mainly to help me remember their names. i'm also pretty sure i've told all of them what i call them. here are some:

serious tim, canadian ben, boston college mike, other mike, captain jack (he left a couple of days after we got here, but he was fun), marco (that's anthony, and i didn't give him that nickname, some lobsterman did), cautious eric, and son of a bitch cameron. there are a couple of other guys who don't have nicknames, 'cause they don't really hang out with us that much. their names are jon and randy. jon helped nicole and cautious eric pull me out of the water after son of a bitch cameron chucked me in. oh, and then there's nate. he taught me to salsa, but i don't really remember how. then he tried to teach me and anthony to salsa together, but that didn't work so well, since neither of us really knew what we were doing.

anyway, all of those guys except for cautious eric know their nicknames. i told serious tim his the other night in the bathroom. yeah, in the men's bathroom. it was ok, 'cause boston college mike took me in there. see, kelly was shaving canadian ben. she was drunk, and so was he. i don't know why he let her do that, but it was funny. anyway, i basically followed serious tim around the bathroom while he was trying to brush his teeth and take out his contacts, and my mouth did not stop running. it must not have bothered him, though, because he joined the party for a little while.

so, i've probably been drinking a tad too much on this trip, but my sea lab friends are a partying bunch. last night we took a break. but everybody loves drunk latina. i'm funny when i'm drunk. i say classic things like, "do you mind being quiet, 'cause we're trying to drink out here?" and "if i fall in the fire you can touch me in inappropriate places." there's a story behind that, but i'll save it for later. right now i'm going to see when dinner will be ready.

Maine

hello from maine, everyone. i just have time for a quick update, since i'm about to go walk some trails with my roomie for this trip, nicole. here's the quick version of what the last week and a half have been like:

set up experiments, drank more than we should have (only 3 sober nights since we arrived), hanging out with the boys from the darling marine center ('cause their girls think we're bitches), trying to get a ride to the airport thursday. i met a nice boy named anthony who doesn't try to take advantage of me when i'm drunk. he gives me lots of water when he thinks i've had enough. his roommate cameron is a bitch. they all went pier jumping one night (in the freezing cold water), and i refused 'cause it is fucking cold here. so, anthony gave me his wallet to hold while he went in the water, and then cameron snuck up behind me, picked me up like a baby, and jumped in the water with me. once again, it was fucking cold. i could have killed him. i called him a son of a bitch, like, twenty times, and for some reason that inspired him to hug me, but not to apologize. because the SOB is not sorry. he thought it was funny. anthony gave me dry clothes after that (because our cabins are about half a mile from the water, and their dorms are right there). i like anthony. he is a nice boy (which i swear i've told him at least 50 times). because i repeat myself a lot when i'm drunk.

ok, nicole is here now, so i'm going to run. ciao!

Stupid Terrorists

so i guess i lied. that last one wasn't my last post before i leave for maine. i was just checking out the weather for the next 10 days in the small town of walpole, maine, where the darling marine center is located (that's where i'm going, in case you didn't catch that). you know, to plan my wardrobe and all. and dude! it's, like, cold there for summer! highs in the mid-70's, lows in the 50's and 60's. holy crap. combine that with 58 degree water, and that doesn't make for a happy latina. at least we're going in summer and not later in the fall. i'd really freeze my ass off then. their high temperatures are what i'm used to for the overnight lows way down here in the south in august. that's like april and late october weather for us. i'm defitnitely going to minimize the time that i spend actually being in that freezing ass water up there. it's only 30 degrees colder than the water i've been in all summer*. that's not that big a difference, right?

anyway, i'm a tad bit peeved at the stupid terrorists (but i'm glad their evil plot was foiled) who made liquids in my carry-on bag a no no. i can't take toothpaste? or eye drops? what the hell, man? i'll eat some toothpaste in front of you and squeeze some drops in my eyes to prove it's legit. i swear. but at least they haven't banned carry-on luggage all together like they did in the UK. and here i was checking to make sure i'm allowed to take a disposable razor in my carry-on (which i am). but now, it doesn't matter, since my shampoo and conditioner aren't allowed. i guess it will all just have to go in the suitcase that i check.

i'm the teeniest bit nervous about flying now. i hope that no one has anything against atlanta or portland... or memphis or amsterdam or madrid. those are all the airports i'll be visiting in the next month. yikes. i'll have lots of reassuring phone calls to make once i get to maine and spain and back home. oh, and i also hope that no one has the urge to blow up any spanish trains. that would suck.

ok, enough freaking myself out about flying. it'll be fine.

*that was sarcasm, folks.

Looking Up

hello again. i seem to be disappearing for long periods of time, and for that i apologize. i've decided that i just don't blog when i'm sad and sappy. i'm sure you all realize that the last couple of weeks have been, um, emotionally trying for me, and i just didn't feel like laying all that stuff on you guys. but i'm back for now. this will probably be my last post for a while, too. see, i leave for maine on saturday, and i'm not sure how much internet access i'm going to have while i'm there and then in spain. i'll try to let you guys know how things are going, though.

things are definitely looking up for me now. surprisingly, they let my mom out of the hospital monday, so no more daily trips to pensacola for me. she's doing much better now, but she's going to be on all kinds of diabetes medicine now, what with her pancreas being pretty much fucked and all. but at least it's not trying to eat itself anymore, and it's not leaking digestive enzymes around her other organs anymore. so, hooray for that. i think she's going to be kind of taking it easy for a while. i'm going over there tonight to see her and sammi before i leave for a month.

oh, and some of you know that my 24th birthday was sunday, so that's always fun. well, this one wasn't fun exactly, but still. chad and i ate dinner at san miguel (it's the nicest mexican restaurant i've ever set foot in, btw), and we unpacked a little. we still have crap sitting everywhere, though. i really hate that, but i just don't have the time or the energy to devote to getting the rest of our stuff into the appropriate places.

sorry this post couldn't be more entertaining, but i have to run now. adios!